Vitamin A & vitamin D >> Accutane (SUCCESS!)

There was some hoopla a few months ago when I made a thread entitled "vitamn d for acne" or something like that. I posted a small blog written in 1937 on how high doses of vitamin D over a period of months improved or cured acne.

I've taken vitamin A since April 1st 2008 and vitamin D April 27th 2008. I've taken both before in the form of cod liver oil (providing about 14000 IU of vit A and 1400 IU of vit D per tablespoon or 14g) but it never really cured my acne...just kept it at bay.

My acne was mostly large pores and oily skin. Pimples were not large in numbers.

It's been almost 5 months since I took large doses of vitamin A and 4 months since I took large doses of vitamin D. I really didn't see real results until maybe 3.5 to 4 months into the regimen. How much did I take? I started off on 100,000 IU of vitamin A/day and worked my way up to 700,000 IU/day then settled back down to 200,000 IU/day. But I never took less than 100,000 IU. I don't think the large doses speed up the process (just because you give someone more money, doesn't mean they work faster either, there's a limit as to how fast someone or something goes) but it does allow the body (namely the liver) to store more of it. On vitamin D I took 4000 IU for every 100,000 IU of vitamin A that I took then bumped it up to around 60,000 IU/day (I increased my D dosage each time my A dosage went up). I took vitamin K2 (up to 25mg/day...which is A LOT) as well during the time, but not sure what effect that had to do with it.

I've seen people on Accutane but never seem to get rid of large pores and blackheads and they still have oily skin. But there are some people who've taken Accutane and have all those problems disappear.

Just to let you guys know, I've never taken Accutane...so my results aren't bias (whatever you want to call bias). Some people questioned my sanity on taking such massive amounts of vitamins, but are they really massive or just massive in comparison to the paltry limits set by the FDA (or USDA or whatever)? Your body can produce 10's of thousands of IUs of vitamin D in a matter of minutes (about 10 to 40, depending on your skin tone), yet no one has ever died from the "massive" vitamin D produced from your skin. Yet it seems massive because the RDA is 400 IU, so something like 20,000 IU is "massive"...even though your body was meant to create this much. There have been cultures and even people today who consumed massive amounts of vitamin A with no ill effects. 5000 IU, the RDA, is barely what your body uses in a day anyways...and most people consume far less of this. I'm talking about retinol, pure natural vitamin A. Nothing synthetic (no palmitate or acetate) and nothing pro-vitamin A (no carotenes). Vitamin D must be consumed as D3 and nothing else. Even people with liver disfunction has the ability to hydroxylate cholecalciferol...it's one of the first and last functions of the liver even when it is damaged.

As far as symptoms goes, chelitis (chap lips) is the only symptom that I've had. And remember I took 730,000 IU of vitamin A along with 63,000 IU of vitamin D at the same time with 25mg of vitamin K2.

You generally can use any brand of vitamin A and D, just make sure they are in the form of retinol (usually fish liver) and cholecalciferol (D3). I use Carlson's only because their softgels are very small and very easy to swallow (I took 20 of the vitamin D3 softgels and 12 of the vitamin A softgels all in one swallow...it is THAT easy) and because they are SOY FREE. I'm allergic to soy anyways. Even though the oil used is not what I recommend (safflower and sunflower), the amount of the oil used is so little and the benefits of vitamin A and D3 are so monumental that it far outweighs the oils being used in the supplements.

Of course I also take a lot of minerals in the form of dairy and meat (I take a separate magnesium supplement). I don't believe that vitamins alone can do the trick, but if they can they don't do the trick well. Just make sure to get enough of the three main minerals: calcium, magnesium, and phosphorus. Milk contains plenty of phosphorus (heck, most foods do) and calcium. You can get magnesium from whole grains and vegetables but you have to deal with phytates and oxalates that hampers absorption.

There's much more than Vitamin D and A does than just promote skin health...but I always believed that there have never been a serious use for any drug, prescription or OTC, and that acne is really a result of our environment. Lack of sun during peak UVB hours, bad food choices like hydrogenated oils and MSG, and just exposure to excessive lead and dioxins.

So what's my advice on how to start off? 100,000 IU/day of vitamin A and 10,000 IU of vitamin D/day for 5 months should pretty much get rid of your acne or calm it down at least 80%. Taking more won't speed up the process though. But it does allow your body to store more for later. A maintenence dose after that would probably be like 30,000 to 50,000 IU vitamin A and 4000 to 7000 IU vitamin D.

My pores have shrunk, my skin is FAR LESS oily, and I have FAR FEWER blackheads. My eczema has really calmed down too and so has my psoriasis. It sounds far-fetched and it sounds like I'm BSing but I've been to these forums for almost 3 years now (look at my profile). Do you really think I would lie to any of you? I'd have nothing to gain (and evidence to back me up if you want it). Seriously it's mega cheap. A bottle of carlson's 25,000 IU vitamin A (from cod liver oil - 250 softgels) is like $15...that's a 2 month supply. A bottle of carlson's 2,000 IU vitamin D (from cholecalciferol - 360 softgels) is about $11. That's a 2.5 month supply if you take 100,000 IU and 10,000 IU of vitamin A and D respectively. A grand total of $13/month (minus shipping)!!!!

I'm not trying to promote the carlson's brand, I gave reasons why I prefer it. Any other brand would work too. My local safeway sells 100 of 1000 IU vitamin D3 tablets for $2!!!!

If you're not into supplements you can always take cod liver oil (like 2 tablespoons) and liverwurst and get some sun during 10AM to 3PM for 40 minutes. It's not too hard to get 100,000 IU of vitamin A through diet. You can be creative and make fried rice from liverwurst (it's really tasty). It'll kind of look like dirty rice, but eh.

Lastly, consume mostly saturated fat. It helps your body use vitamin D and omega 3 fatty acids. Avoid vegetable oils at all cost! A slip up here and there won't hurt, but don't make them part of your regimen...it'll only slow your progress.

Any questions, please post them here...I want everyone to see the answers to the questions.

Shaving to reduce acne scars?

I remember reading some thread here about shaving to reduce acne scars a week ago, but I can't find it.

So I did a google search and came across this:

http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php?t=33197

A few members talked about improvement in as little as a week. I'm giving this a try. Because what I noticed is that my chin area is virtually free of acne scars...despite the fact that I've had huge cystic pimples in that area MANY times. It should have scarred, but it didn't and I shave there everyday. I use the "torq" blade from K-mart's American Fare brand...which has six, yes SIX, blades. I doubt it would take me a week to notice an improvement, but it's cheap...easy, and I shave everyday. So why not? I might nick myself, but we've all got to take chances. Besides, the pimples that I've gotten haven't scarred (I haven't had many) since I've undertaken adequete nutrition (lots of vitamins like D3 and retinol along with vitamin K2 as well as minerals).

The thread describes "method shaving", whatever the hell that means. I just wet shave, basically using water and some acne cleanser (namely acne.org's acne cleanser).

I've done this for 3 days now, I'll probably stop on Monday night to give my skin a day to heal and then start shaving over scarred areas again.

Scars on face vs. scars on rest of body

I noticed something. The other day I got a pretty good scrape on my hand that was probably a few milimeters deep. I was sure this would leave some indented scar on my hand.

Yet just a few days later the wound had pretty much healed, despite the fact that I did not put a bandage on it and washed my hands often (which leads to infection since you're washing off the scabs). There was no indentation, and I tried looking for one. I tried every angle possible with every light source yet the wound was healed. No evidence of scarring AT ALL.

Is there something about the face that causes scarring? Is it some evolutionary thing? I'm sure the body would want to protect the hands because it is constantly abused more than the face but still. Is it because massive oil production impedes the process? Or is the result of acne leaving some kind of DNA change that inhibits proper wound healing?

I've gotten several milimeter deep scars on my hands and legs yet everytime there is NO indentation. I much rather have my scars on my face be transferred to other areas of my body (like anyone here would).

I remember that there was this burn scar on my hand that would never go away (it stayed for years), but after some adequate nutrition it went away. Yet if this was a scar on the face, it would pretty much be permanent. When the burn scar healed it's like the body knew it was damaged and would only fix it if it had adequate materials. Yet it's like the body doesn't realize the damage on the face isn't fully fixed. What gives?

Chromium curbs appetite?

I know that whenever I eat a lot of junk I would never gain weight, no matter what foods I ate and how much. Yet that doesn't mean nothing bad happens but I knew it wasn't normal. A few years ago I tried to limit what I eat and how much, but damn...my ravenous appetite would usually win out. Not only that I would eat and I could feel my stomach hitting it's physiological limit yet I was still insanely hungry. I would eat over 6000 calories with ease per day, but now I can easily cut that down to under 2000. Some days I feel so full without eating that I can keep it under 1000.

I then read something about chromium curbing carb cravings. Before chromium the foods I wanted most were carb heavy like red beans & rice and donuts. But after taking 400mcg of chromium/day my appetite has gone down by over half. I feel full after meals too. I figure that since I'm skinny (116 lbs.) I might as well just curb on food (and help my wallet) since I am never going to gain weight.

I hope some of you guys consider chromium...it REALLY helps my appetite.

Vitamin D

About 1.5 years ago or so I read up on how the glycemic index diet or glycemic load diet was the way to go. Two tribes, Ache and Kitavan, were studied and had no signs of acne...none...despite the thousands of subjects stuided. The authors proposed that the diet did not spike blood glucose as high...even though a good portion of their diet consisted of tubers (basically things like potatoes and yams, things that DO spike blood glucose). Additionally the diets of these two tribes were roughly 70% carbohydrates. Yet their disease rates of diabetes, cancer, depression, and other western diseases were absent.

So I thought this was a possible link, and I proceeded on a low glycemic diet. I was on it for like, maybe 6 or 7 months. Virtually no improvement of my acne (though my acne is mostly in the form of oily skin and large pores).

So then I tried a very low carb diet, like <40g of carbs a day. Again, my acne did not really improve too much at all.

Then I tried eating things without drinking, and this actually did help a bit...it wasn't a placebo effect either. ..but it never got rid of it. And I ate things like cookies and cakes too.

Obviously frustrated, I researched and researched. I googled everything, from "vitamin a" and acne to selenium, to lipoic acid, everything. I stumbled upon the Vitamin D Council in early 2007, but never made too much of it. After all I thought vitamin D was only useful for bone diseases, so why would I care for it if I wanted to banish my acne?

Fast forward a year later and just for kicks I typed in [vitamin d acne] on google and found virtually nothing related between the two. But I refined my search to ["vitamin d" acne], and found an article:

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/picrender...mp;blobtype=pdf

This article was dated in 1937 for crying out loud...but acne still existed back then, well before the use of things like hydrogenated oils and fried foods became common place. In summary the doctor treated his patients with pre-vitamin D: viosterol.

Now viosterol isn't produced by our bodies, it's actually the plant form of previtamin D. It's synthesized from ergosterol (the plant form of cholesterol) and then converted to vitamin D2(ergocalciferol). He estimated that he used 5000 to 14,000 IU of viosterol a day for his patients. His patients noticed improvement in one month and some were healed in 2 months with most being free of acne in three months...though there were some treatable relapses he mentions. Some of the doctors noted that there could be synergy with vitamin A (one doctor used 55,000 IU of vitamin A...but did not specify whether this was beta carotene or retinol).

But think about that for a moment. Viosterol is a precursor to vitamin D2, a much less potent form of vitamin D (for humans anyways). Vitamin D3 is almost 2x as potent as vitamin D2 (according to the VDC: vitamin d council) at raising calcidiol levels. You can check my blog to see my progress with vitamin D3.

So going back to the kitavan and ache tribes I was interested in where they were situated: Papua New Guinea and Paraguay, respectively. Then I looked at the world map and noticed the two countries were not situated too far from the equator. In fact, Papua New Guinea is right on the equator and Paraguay is about 15-25 south latitude from the equator...both countries get UVB all year round and the tribes obviously spend a lot of time outdoors. Is it diet or is it the sun? I don't know, but I'm not going to wait around.

To me, it makes sense. The bulk of us spend like 90% of our time indoors and wear sun screen and drive in cars. Plus UVB rays are not always around when the sun is out. We can't produce any vitamin D in our skin for roughly 6 months of the year during fall and winter (mainly for those who live above and below 30 degrees latitude).

Now I'm not saying vitamin D is going to cure everyone's acne...or even make a dent in it. But from what I've researched (believe me, I've spent hundreds of hours of research on vitamin d alone) I'd be shocked if it didn't help people with current acne.

What dose should one use? How long does it take to see results? What type of vitamin D to use?

Typically dosage should at least be a few thousand, minimum of 3000 IU (taken with fat). It's important to eat saturated fat, since mono and polyunsaturated fat decrease binding of vitamin D to vitamin d receptors. You should only use vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol) and nothing else...not even calcidiol or calcitriol (the risk of side effects is much higher...even though your body eventually converts D3 to calcitriol). Of all the research that I've done and all the ailments (multiple sclerosis, osteoporosis, depression, etc.) it seems to take about 3 months...but note that the dosage used wasn't too high, 800 to <2000 IU. Your body, assuming you're light skinned, can make ~20,000 IU of vitamin D in a matter of minutes (about 20-35 min) in noontime sun with minimal clothing during summer. This happens well before you turn pink. So if it takes you 40 minutes to turn pink, then 20 minutes is all you need to achieve maximum vitamin d production for the day. No one has ever died or had any known complications from this much vitamin D from the sun. Does upping the dose make things faster or more permanent? That's for you to decide because I could not find a single study to compare high dose to low dose and speed of treatment...though higher doses are more effective.

Typically 10,000 IU or less is safe for consumption each day (from the sun, supplements, food, or UVB lamps). The RDA of 400IU a day is far too low.

For those who don't have access to noon time sun (10AM to 3PM), oily wild fish is a pretty good source. One 3oz serving of wild salmon provides almost 1000 IU of vitamin D. Cod liver oil is a great source too. But vitamin D from the sun is free and presents no signs of toxicity (because the UVB rays will break down any excess).

I've been on vitamin D therapy for 2 weeks now, at 24,000 IU/day. Not one pimple has formed. Of course I don't plan on staying on this forever. I plan on cutting down to 6,000 IU/day for maintenence. I use Carlson's Vitamin D 2000 IU 360 softgels (they are incredibly tiny, it's very easy to swallow 6 at a time which is what I do) and they cost just $11 a bottle. But I'll see what happens after 2 more weeks, then 2 months, then 3 months (just check my blog).

Remember, D3 or cholecalciferol is what you need and NOTHING ELSE.